1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates in general to certain new and useful improvements in animal feeders and more particularly, to animal feeders of the type which include a barrier to prevent crawling insects from congregating at the food or liquid intended for consumption by an animal.
2. Brief Description of Related Art
There are numerous commercially available animal feeders for containing solid food or liquid to be ingested by an animal and particularly, a pet animal. These feeders usually exist in the form of a bowl or a dish having a cavity to contain the dry food or liquid and they exist in numerous sizes and shapes.
In absence of some positive pest barricade construction, these animal feeders will attract various pests such as ants, roaches and other crawling insects. Indeed, after a short period of time, if the animal feeders contain any food or liquid, other than water and if left unattended, they will attract a sufficient amount of pests to the point where the food is relatively inedible.
In order to eliminate or reduce pest infestation problems, various types of animal feeders have been proposed in the prior art which use a moat arrangement surrounding the food dish portion of the animal feeder. This moat usually contains a liquid such as water which serves as a barrier to preclude access by the insects or other crawling pests to an inner food dish.
A large number of animal feeders which use a moat arrangement have been taught in the prior art and date back as far as 1889, as set forth in U.S. Pat. No. 395,490. Other animal feeders which utilize some type of moat arrangement are taught in U.S. Pat. No. 4,896,627 dated Jan. 30, 1990; U.S. Pat. No. 5,117,778 dated Jun. 2, 1992; U.S. Pat. No. 5,277,149 dated Jan. 11, 1994; U.S. Pat. No. 4,357,905 dated Nov. 9, 1982; U.S. Pat. No. 2,543,465 dated Feb. 27, 1951; U.S. Pat. No. 2,548,301 dated Feb. 5, 1952; U.S. Pat. No. 4,007,711 dated Feb. 15, 1977; and U.S. Pat. No. 2,191,811 dated Feb. 27, 1940.
Each of the animal feeders taught in the aforesaid U.S. patents are all similar in construction and include a moat of water or other liquid surrounding a central food containing dish. While these devices are effective for repelling crawling pest activity, they do present several serious drawbacks. If the water or other liquid in the moat portion of the feeder should evaporate, then the crawling pest barrier is eliminated. Accordingly, a constant vigil must be maintained to ensure that there is always water or other liquid present in the reservoir.
In addition to the problems of evaporation, the pet itself will often drink the water in the moat, unconscious of the fact that the moat is designed to repel crawling insect activity. Consequently, the same problems of monitoring the animal dish are required. Further, after a short period of time, dirt and other foreign matter becomes entrained in the liquid portion of the moat thereby soiling the feeder. As a result, constant cleaning is often required.
There are other types of animal feeders which have been taught in the prior art and include U.S. Pat. No. 2,366,584 dated Jan. 2, 1945; U.S. Design Pat. No. 105,450 date Jul. 27, 1937; U.S. Pat. No. 747,677 dated Dec. 22, 1903; and U.S. Pat. No. 1,896,096 dated Feb. 7, 1933. However, these other animal feeder devices do not overcome the problems of pest infestation.